Kyiv will host the Eurovision song contest properly and on a highest level, the Ukrainian capital's mayor Vitali Klitschko said.
“The capital is objectively the best prepared and suitable city for hosting events of this level. Besides its experience of conducting Eurovision, which Kyiv hosted in 2005, the Ukrainian capital also hosted the final of the European football championship, Euro 2012. So we do have the positive experience and every possibility to prepare duly and on the highest level to conduct the contest in the capital,” Klitschko said at a briefing in Kyiv on Friday.
The contest will be held at the International Exhibition Center (IEC) on the left bank of Dnipro River, because it has a capacity of up to 50,000 spectators, he said.
With two airports, Kyiv has the best air transport links with other cities and countries in Europe and worldwide, the mayor said. Also, Kyiv has enough of hotel rooms of varying level to accommodate guests of the festival, he said. “Today Kyiv has 265 hotels which can accommodate more than 23,000 people,” Klitschko said.
For his part, Ukrainian Culture Minister Yevhen Nishchuk said at the briefing that Kyiv is ready to spend UAH 1.2 billion on preparing for and hosting the Eurovision.
The IEC can take in 12,000-14,000 spectators while the contest’s EuroClub will be located at a building with a helicopter pad near Park Alley, the minister said.
For his part, Zurab Alasania, head of Ukraine’s National Television Company, said that funding for the contest will come from the Kyiv budget, sponsors and investors, national budget, and partly, in June 2016, from the European Broadcasting Union (the founder of Eurovision).
